OSP Salutes mrs. Hannah carey at Kenova elementary

Mrs. Carey's elementary students demonstrate their love for reading while engaging in technology using Scholastic's Bookflix. It offers animated stories with text-to-speech highlighting each word read as well as other fantastic features for teaching reading skills such as: reading comprehension, vocabulary, sequencing, puzzlers, and much more!

There's a new sheriff in town

We would like to announce our new Director of Special Programs, Sherry Webb! She has been with the Office of Special Programs in a supervisory capacity for many years, and now she has moved up one more wrung on the ladder to become the director of the department. She is off to a running start getting things taken care of and working hard as always.

WV State technology conference 2016

The West Virginia State Technology Conference was held in Morgantown, WV, in July of 2016. WVDE's Mark Moore and Wayne County's very own, Tim Conzett, were two of the presenters. Here is a brief summary of a few sessions:Session 1: Add-Ons to OneNote 2016 by Mark Moore Mr. Moore introduced himself and gave us his email and website which offered resources about OneNote and other applications. He talked about many applications, downloadable resources, and add-ons to OneNote that were all free. The following is a description of each one:

Office Lens App: Is great for taking pictures (especially at these conferences) because it will flatten the picture.

OneNote Math Add-Ons for Microsoft (google this): solves and graphs equations; serves as a graphing calculator in 3D among many other things. This helps students who fear math and solving for x. Students should like math, not fear it; so if they already have the answer, their anxiety is reduced and they just have to focus on the “how” instead of the answer.

Onetastic (software to download free macros) found on Macroland website is fantastic. This is a multi-purpose addin for OneNote. You can view notes organized by dates; it has OneCalendar and much more.

OneNote Class Notebook: This is downloadable add that the teacher can set up a personalized workspace for each individual student, a library of contents, and a place to collaborate.

Connections: connects OneNote to everything on the web

OneNote Learning Tools: Mr. Moore refers to this as the “Dyslexia Add-On” because it includes text to speech, speech to text, and options to change settings for fonts, spacing, kearning, and color backgrounds making it easier to read. For example, the comprehension mode colors the verbs red; other parts of speech will be a different color if the user chooses.

At this time, the Add-Ons only work with the PC version (Mac and 2016 coming soon). Note: The client version is not the web. This is the place that teachers can work on the Add-Ons off the web, but changes will be automatically updated to the web.Here are a few other useful resources:-red laser app-www.onenotegem.com-Google “OneNote Add-Ons” because new add-ons are coming out all the time.

Session 2: Big Cat Lessons by Melinda MonksThere is an app called Big Cat Books which is great to help teach reading to special education students. PCI reading is probably the best, according to Monks, but it is limited. This is a great supplemental resource. The website http://tinyurl.com/BigCatLesson is where you can find a lesson plan called 3-2-1 Dark Night Story which covers three days.Students will need to download the Skitch App. Once you take a photo, you open Skitch and can write answers on photos and send to teacher. Big Cat Books is great because no one knows who is not reading or writing so anxiety is reduced for students. Students can choose to read individually and can record self-reading. Big Cat Books also has an assessment tool.Another resource is: sock puppets app. Sock Puppets allows you to create your own lip-synched, cartoon sock puppet in seconds for you to share on social media. Students work together to create conversations, backgrounds, scenery, and props.This was a very short presentation due to internet and technology issues.

Session 3: Excellent Digital Tools to Support the 4 Cs Teaching and Learning with Technology by Jason Jackson and Randall Black (Grades 7-12)The 4 Cs are: communication, collaboration, creativity, critical thinking. Instruction needs to focus on the 4 Cs to prepare them for today’s society. There are many digital tools to help teachers practice these in the classroom.www.polleverywhere.com (free and paid versions) This is an easy to use interface that is great for surveys that show immediate results of students’ responses for informal assessments. Options include multiple choice, open ended, click on graphics, etc. There is a OneNote Add-On. Students will need a device with a text feature (cell phone is most common).EDpuzzle.com allows you to trim videos into a puzzle and have students answer questions about the video clip (ex. YouTube informational video, Khan Academy, TedTalks, LearnZillion, NumberFile, CrashCourse). Teacher can also use voice over to add more explanation or direction. Teachers can add due dates and a gradebook feature is coming soon. Students can create their own EDpuzzles.Chalkup is an easy to use, free tool for classroom conversation and collaboration. This is great for grades 6-12 used on a desktop, not phone or Ipad. It has discussion threads that you can add polls, media, links, text, and questions. The Look Ahead will show assignments coming due in a calendar format. The Materials tab allow you to put your syllabus, links, pdfs, etc. There is a default grading scale under Grading, but you could change the grading scale to a rubric.Canva allows you to create your own images with snazzy designs in seconds for website or IOS App platforms. This is free and targets grades 4-12.

Session 4: MY VR SPOT by Michael Kessler and Chris UrbanMyVRSPOT is tool for video hosting and sharing made easy. It is great for the flipped classroom, demonstration videos, celebrity read alouds, school programs, morning principal announcements (timesaver because it normally takes 30 minutes to prepare, but principal has it done in 3 minutes), and informational videos to put on website for parents to see what students are working on in school. It can be used by teacher/staff or student led. This resource is also useful for live streaming and ePortfolios.Users create a login and upload videos to bring in content to the gallery (which later you will be able to sort content). You can drag and drop multiple files at once, upload from YouTube, Vimeo, etc. When you upload videos, you will have the option to change your thumbnail, assign or create tags, and write a description of each video. MY VR SPOT strips out all ads, suggestive content, and comments from YouTube. All you get is the raw video because it blocks the YouTube URL and uses MY VR SPOT’s URL. Remember to view all videos before uploading/sharing. There is also a built in recorder and camera.A district-wide video repository can be created where administrators, teachers, and students upload and share content in a district-controlled environment. All users have access to all videos if it is marked “public.” You can choose who access to your videos. MY VR SPOT is very secure and ad-free. Equipment needed includes: tripod, gadget holder, and gadget (iPad or iPhone).Students want to be published and recognized so this is a great engaging, hands-on learning resource. Teachers get permission to video students. If students are not allowed, they are not left out, just not recorded.There are five ways to share videos outside the district:

Share videos with URL links.

Embed videos into web pages.

Create a Video Showcase or Gallery on your own district or school website.

On your waffle, click on videos. This is our own filtered video channel. From the above website, scroll down to video channels, click on “request a video channel” for grown-ups only; however, students can edit content only (under settings), but monitor their edits! You can control who can access/see your channel. Allow about 24hours after upload to view. This is great for the flipped classroom, announcements, video showcases, demonstrations, instructional videos, and much more.

Upload the video as the highest resolution that you can; Office365 will take care of the rest so everyone can view it regardless of an old phone/tablet or new. You can control whether or not you want users to download your video to view online or offline. You can have as many video channels as you want and size doesn’t matter.

Under Video Channels (under waffle) WV Internal Use Only, you will find a video of Mr. Moore’s video on his visit to Ohio University’s STEM Metro School. The school believes that learning starts with a problem and every problem has a solution. They do not get funding so everything is used and nothing thrown away. In the FabLab (Fabrication Lab), only students and teachers who have completed and passed the safety and user training may enter. This is where they build things with machinery to solve problems. The library, now called “The Foundry” has been turned into a library/museum housing only some books, fiction mostly. Mr. Moore’s video was created in PowerPoint Mix shared among the WVDE population.

Session 7: Office Mix by Mark Moore

Office Mix will only work on Office 2013 or 2016 (Mac is coming soon) in order to create it, but anyone can view it (if you set the setting as public). Go to mix.office.com to install the free software. Slide recording means you can record yourself to play inside of your presentation. This allows you to present and not be present. When you upload to Office Mix (under the new “Mix” tab), it transfers to html file so it will work for everyone. This uploads it to the web in Office Mix and gives you a website address. You set your access settings. This does not work on PowerPoint Online at this time; it is only on the client version. If you have a student who has anxiety in presenting, you can allow the student to use Office Mix and they can video him/herself in the privacy of home. There are tutorials at: http://wvde.state.wv.us/office365.

In Office Mix, you also have the option to record a screen from the internet, desktop, how to use the calculator on your desktop, and record your voice (see countdown to know when to start talking). If you record the screen and there is a video, it will capture the video. To stop recording, hit Windows, Shift, Q. You can also publish it to Office365 video. This is not a video editor. You can put a video in the Notebook.

On the Mix ribbon (menu), you can create a quiz under “Quizzes Videos Apps” in various formats: T/F, multiple choice (with one or more correct answers), short answer, etc. You can set limited attempts and decide to show answer key for each question.

When you login to the website, Office Mix, you see all the videos that you’ve ever created and see how many visitors, views, average amount of time spent. You can add the PHET app for fun, science add-ins. Many sites such as Khan Academy are creating add-ins for this program. You can speed up the video (normal speed for first listen, and speed it up if you missed something and need to hear it again).

Caution: Under the “Upload to Office Mix” on the ribbon, the “Enable playback on mobile devices” takes twice as long to upload but it allows mobile device users to access. Always check this box for the finished product. Preview it before you publish it. If you need to edit the published mix, you have to go to the original presentation and publish it again.

Session 8: Students in the Driver’s Seat; Better Learning Through Choice by Rebecca Recco

Sometimes, it’s scary handing over control to your students. Remember when you were little and getting lost in play? Kids remember and learn when they are having fun. If we give students choices, they are engaged, better behaved, take bigger risks, have more confidence, and demonstrate more success. There is no down time and have more fun! When students choose their own activities, they tend to remember it better and learning becomes “sticky.”

How it works:-Provide choice menus (allows students to have control) such as Word Work Tic-Tac-Toe, Menu Final Project, and Baseball Theme Learning Menu (check out Pinterest).-Offer choice seating to allow students to sit in the place they need for the task (comfy chair for leisure reading; hard chair and table for critical thinking; round table for collaboration).-Do flipped instruction which allows the teacher to do something else and students can see from teacher’s perspective and replay. This is also helpful when student comes in late and misses the instruction. Teacher can send them straight over to center and watch videoed instruction on Ipad.-Assign summative projects with criteria for students to choose media/form and demonstrate learning.-Allow for unstructured innovation time. The education pendulum is moving away from standardized tests and teacher-led instruction moving to student-led instruction using creativity.-Start small by picking one project and giving three student choices.-Create flexible spaces to collaborate and do projects. Items should be easy to move.-Leave the classroom. Work outside.-Consider an expedition.-Feed your own creative learning spirit. It is important that teachers to continue to learn and explore their own creative learning spirit. Learning feels good!

Session 9: Using Technology Tools with All Students; Unlocking Technology for Students with Significant Learning Disabilities

There are several apps and digital tools that open up a new world to our students with significant learning disabilities. Our students with SLD face several issues- physical, mental, and lack of support from other (such as administration). Many times, special educators cannot even get a set of the newly ordered curriculum; go seek it out. You, as the teacher, must be their advocate to get materials and access to their education. Change accessibility settings on iPads and computers to meet the needs of your students. On IPad: go to settings, accessibility. Speak Selection is better than voiceover, especially for those with motor issues. Reduce motion feature decreases the background moving (for orientation). By turning on Touch Accommodations, you control the hold duration for students who need to touch longer or touches too long. You can also delay the gestural touch. If students have fine motor issues and cannot point with one finger, under accessibility, go to AssistiveTouch (gestures) to choose how many fingers the student needs to touch the screen. If you scroll down to bottom, click on Guided Access in order to keep the iPad in a single app and allows the teacher to control what features are available. You can set a passcode, time limit (great for IEP goal of working/staying on task for 10minutes), and set a chime of your choice. You can set an accessibility shortcut by: turn on Guided Access, choose app, and set timer to lock students into one app (triple click home button, put in passcode, to turn on/off guided access).

Here are some other tips and resources:-Guided Access: Apple products seem to be better than Android for increasing accessibility. -Padlet app: a digital blank piece of paper where photos, videos (stored on their site), notes, recordings, websites and more can be attached to specific topic.-Puppet EDU app: great for nonverbal students to use and create videos.-Thinglink app: find an image, add target on the image, and you can add captions and videos-Animoto.com (scroll down to bottom to apply for an educator account and 50 free student accounts)-iMovie- One great app is EPIC (go to www.getepic.com) for educational videos.-Frontier Heroes is an app on history.

Don’t allow yourself- or your students- to be limited. Instead, allow your students to work to their fullest potential. The book, “Kids Deserve It,” is a wonderful resource. Share student successes.

Session 10: #WVEDCHAT; Live at #WVSTC by Randall Black

Questions always start with letter Q and answers start with A. Using the hashtag # do a search and keep refreshing. There are tools that make this easier. The first tool is owned by Twitter called tweetdeck.twitter.com. WVEDCHAT.com will link your Twitter account and the purpose of this is to get you talking with others in the WVDE family (collaborate) and develop your PLNs. WVEDCHAT takes place every other Tuesday at 8pm.

Link to Presentation: tinyurl.com/ASResourcesALL students should be given a choice to read or use text to speech format, not just students with IEPs. There will always be struggling readers who don’t qualify for special education but need help. Children who fall behind as readers read less; this, in turn, can increase the skills gap between struggling readers and their peers. Self-efficacy is half the battle in learning to read. Give students a choice of what to read and when to read.

-Goodreads is helpful to track your books that you’ve read and books that you want to read.-Audible is books on audio human-read; first month is free and subscription thereafter. An excerpt of The Truth According to Us (book about Romney) was played.-www.perkinselearning.org (look for ASR instructional strategies)-Google Docs: Introducing Text to Speech-pdf.texthelp.com (to import a URL to read the text aloud)-Natural Reader-Robot Talk (free app from Microsoft Store): copy and paste text into box to read aloud; no tracking-Read&Write for Google ChromeVoiceOver idevices-Use the Dyslexic font: Dyslexie Font-OpenDyslexic Font